Homecomings usually bring to mind football games, queens and dances.

But we’re celebrating a real homecoming this weekend, one a lot more significant than a party for alumni returning to their alma mater.

Members of the 152nd Field Artillery unit return to Bangor today, and about 130 members of the Auburn-based 619th Transportation Company will be home Monday. Both units deployed to Iraq in January 2004, and have served honorably under difficult circumstances. Unfortunately, not all of the units’ soldiers will be home. Several have remained behind to tie up loose ends.

The 619th was stationed in Talil and performed more than 278 missions, covering more than 1.2 million miles. The 152nd found itself serving in the shadow of a nightmare. The unit helped bring order to Abu Ghraib prison in the wake of the detainee abuse scandal.

Maine’s largest unit in Iraq, the 133rd Engineer Battalion, is scheduled to come home later this year.

As the National Guard and Reserve soldiers make their way back to Maine, we feel a sense of relief that they have made it home safely and an abiding gratitude for their service in a faraway and dangerous place.

We join a grateful nation and a grateful state in welcoming home our citizen soldiers.